Linda Martin

In 1992, Linda Martin and Mary Jordan became the first Green Party candidates for U.S. Senate.

Mary Jordan ran for U.S. Senate in Alaska, receiving over 20,000 votes, 8.37% of the total vote in a three way race against the infamous Frank Murkowski. Linda Martin ran for U.S. Senate in Hawai’i against an entrenched Democratic Party in 1992 against Daniel Inouye, who had been in the Senate since 1962, and who handedly defeated his opponents winning over 70% of the vote in every re-election – that is until 1992. Linda Martin earned 49,921 votes, 13.73%, holding Inouye to 57.3%, while the Republican picked up 26.9%. Her race changed Hawai’i politics, and Green Party politics, setting records for both total votes and percent of votes by a Green in a partisan race. In this video, Mike Feinstein interviews Linda Martin in 2003 about her campaign.

Two years later, Barbara Blong picked up 140,567 votes running for U.S. Senate in California. In the 1990s, Greens ran for U.S. Senate in Alaska (twice), Hawai’i, California, Maine, Oregon (twice), New Mexico, and New York.